Last week, the Cabinet rejected a recommendation from the National Personnel Authority to raise bonuses and special allowances for some government employees, believing that the public, disillusioned by a constant stream of money scandals involving politicians and bureaucrats, wouldn't stand for it. But even before these scandals the citizenry resented the kind of perks that public workers enjoy as a matter of course. It's resentment born of envy: How else to explain why college graduates continually list government service as their top career choice even though everyone knows it's as dull as dirt.
Tokyo Gov. Shintaro Ishihara has staked his career on sticking it to the central government, so he has no problem exploiting this attitude. In September, at the urging of his feisty new vice-governor, Fukuchiji Inose, he visited the site of a planned residence for Upper House members in the expensive Kioi-cho neighborhood of Chiyoda Ward. Construction was supposed to begin last July, but in May neighbors filed a petition to stop it and a month later Inose came out against the residence himself. The petitioners would seem to have the law on their side since the property in question comes under a local "scenic area" regulation that prohibits the building of any structure taller than 15 meters unless it serves the "public benefit." The new residence would be 56 meters high, and, according to Inose, such a "luxury dormitory" offers no "public benefit."
A group of reporters accompanied the governor on his tour of the leafy vacant lot. In the shadow of the high-rise Akasaka Prince Hotel, he talked about preserving Tokyo's green spaces and natural environment, but the reporters knew what he really wanted to say. They dashed back to their offices and wrote stories about spoiled politicians paying peanuts for fabulous digs in the city center.